


counting down

by tansypool



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, slightly premature nye fic, utterly shameless fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-09-06 08:40:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16829023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tansypool/pseuds/tansypool
Summary: The Doctor picks up Yaz for a slightly belated New Year's celebration.





	counting down

**Author's Note:**

> Written in a midnight blur in less than three hours, so thanks to that sudden burst of inspiration and motivation that lined up for once.

Yaz finishes her shift at seventeen minutes past six – her nine hour shift had spiralled into over twelve hours, with more drunk-and-disorderlies than she’d care to count. She likes the challenge and excitement of the New Year shifts, but she does _not_ like the exhaustion that came once the adrenaline wears off and the first hint of dawn peeks through the clouds.

She was glad she’d planned ahead – a bottle of Tesco Finest Prosecco, hidden under her bed, knowing full well that the shops would sell out long before she finished work. Not that she had any plans of touching it after work – instead, she all but falls through the door, walks by one of Sonya’s mates passed out on the couch, nearly falls asleep in the shower, and then actually falls asleep still in her towel.

\---

The only thing to jolt Yaz out of her rest is the insistent buzz of her phone, at one in the afternoon. She answers it blearily, hoping it isn’t work. It isn’t.

“Yaz, you’re not awake yet? The day’s half over!”

She knows her mother cares, she really does, but sometimes she can be a little overzealous with it.

“Mum, I finished at six?!” There’s nothing Yaz wants more than to go back to sleep, but her mother’s voice in her ear has shattered that thought.

“Never mind, you’re awake now. I’m at the supermarket, do we have any yoghurt left, or did your father use it all last night?”

“I— no idea, hold on,” Yaz mumbles, before crawling out from under her duvet and her towel, and finding her dressing gown where it landed after the last time she wore it. Whenever that was. She’s still half-asleep, and these days, her grasp on the passage of time is shaky at the best of times.

She stumbles towards the kitchen, phone wedged between her ear and her shoulder, still tying her dressing gown. Sonya’s friend is long gone, thankfully, but from the looks of things, Sonya still isn’t awake.

There’s a Tupperware container filled with biryani in the fridge, with a post-it note on it – “Yaz – For when you’re up – Dad.” The pot of yoghurt is in its usual place, but when she checks, it’s nearly empty. Not even enough to warrant putting it back in the fridge – probably Sonya’s efforts.

“Yeah, we’re out, or as good as,” she mumbles into the phone.

“Lovely, thank you, darling, I’ll see you later.” Her mother hangs up before Yaz can respond, so she keeps the yoghurt remnants out, and pulls out the biryani too. It’s food that she doesn’t have to think about, which makes it perfect breakfast food.

She throws the tub into the microwave, and sets the kettle to boil – she’s up now, she may as well stay up. She works through the steps in her head: take the biryani out, try not to get it all over the counter when she stirs it, put it back in as their microwave is crap and it is nowhere near warmed through.

Her tea is steeping and she’s watching the tub rotate when a jolt runs through her core, and she’s suddenly very awake.

It’s a quarter past one, and she’s meeting the Doctor at three, if the TARDIS lands properly.

That’s it, she’s properly awake, trying not to think about her pulse skyrocketing, nor the heat rising in her chest.

It’s not as if it’s been that long since she last saw the Doctor. She thinks back – yesterday, she’d taken off at about half two with the Doctor, and spent two weeks with her on a desert planet covered in hot springs and aliens horrified by the concept of bipedalism. Two weeks sounds about right. She’s mostly just glad that she took a nap in the TARDIS before landing back in Sheffield at three, even remembering to lay out the clothes she wore when she left, so nobody would suspect a thing. After work, it feels like far longer ago than less than twenty-four hours.

It had just been the two of them, this time. Graham had been intent on a break, and Ryan had been willing to accompany him, this time around. Yaz has been enjoying seeing them get closer – she has also enjoyed the side effect of spending more time with the Doctor, rather than feeling like a third wheel. Not that she’d admit it.

She burns her tongue on the tea and the biryani, and rinses her dishes possibly a little too quickly before throwing them in the dishwasher that she doesn’t check for whether the dishes are clean or dirty. Straight to the shower – no, not quite. She grabs the prosecco from her bedroom, where Sonya had mercifully not seen it, and puts it in the fridge. _Then_ the shower, to shower properly, rather than rinse off a twelve hour shift.

The rush of hot water makes her a little dizzy, for just a moment – after her after-school activities in her teens and the unignorable layer of grime that she always ends work with, she’s far too used to showers as an evening event, and they always make her a little sleepy. This is never helped by already being a bit sleep-deprived – the food and tea have helped, somewhat, but the warmth and the sudden need to relax are an unconscious association.

She realises that she’s possibly been in there longer than anticipated when she’s interrupted by a knock on the door – “Hurry up, you’ve been in there for bloody ever!” So Sonya’s awake. She’s been eighteen for three weeks and has evidently already had a bigger night out than Yaz ever has.

“Sorry, I’m nearly done!” She manically rinses the last of the conditioner from her hair, and jumps out. When she leaves the bathroom, Sonya sticks her tongue out at her; she returns the gesture.

By that point, it’s nearly two in the afternoon. Yaz sets her phone to charge, dresses, and sets an alarm for half past, just long enough for a bit of a rest. And then her mind starts to wander – to the thought of the Doctor on the desert planet, the way her eyes lit up talking to the locals. Definitely not to the Doctor in the hot springs. Definitely not there.

She’s clearly not getting any rest, so she decides on more tea – a distraction instead.

Her mother is already back, though clearly not long ago – she’s still putting away groceries, but she stops when she sees Yaz walk in, pulls her into a hug, and kisses her in the general area of her forehead, precision not a priority over a “Happy new year” in her ear.

She returns the hug, and lets it linger for a second. “Happy new year, Mum.”

She knows that it’s only been a few months for her family since she started travelling – but for her, it has been far longer, and it has made the time with her family feel far more scattered. It’s making her appreciate it more, too. They’re far less annoying in smaller doses, though.

And then she fills the kettle and boils it again, lets her mother rant about the chaos in the only supermarket nearby that’s open, makes cups of tea as she hears about how the kids in the flat next door made a racket during the fireworks and how Sonya made a worse one when she got home.

She listens, and chips in where it seems appropriate, and tries not to watch the clock.

\---

Three minutes to three, and there’s a knock on the door, erratic enough that Yaz knows exactly who it is, but her mother is on her feet first.

And then there’s the Doctor, in her doorway, as energetic and with as wide a smile as ever. “Oh, hi, Najia, happy new year!” She does avoid the hug, this time.

Her mother pauses for a split second, before letting the Doctor in with a “Happy new year, Doctor,” and giving Yaz a very pointed look, that Yaz really doesn’t want to acknowledge. It’s the look of _We still have not discussed this_.

Not that Yaz has been avoiding that particular conversation, or anything. It’s just that whenever the Doctor comes up, she’s just suddenly reminded of something else very important that she had to tell her mother about. A complete coincidence.

And it isn’t as though the Doctor has noticed that pointed look, or Yaz resolutely ignoring it. “I thought I’d drop by, because, well, we had plans, but I was in the area, so I thought I’d come pick her up – she didn’t get a proper New Year’s celebration, if she was at work, so we might as well do something after to celebrate, shouldn’t we?”

Just like last time, the Doctor is just creating more questions. Yaz makes her way out of the living room very quickly, letting her voice trail off from her mother’s inevitable probing: “Let me just grab my coat, and we can get going!” She knows exactly what sort of questions she’ll be asked, she doesn’t need to hear them.

Coat, check; phone, check; bag with the biscuits she’d forgotten she bought alongside the prosecco, check. She grabs the prosecco, suppresses the urge to grab the Doctor’s hand, and waves cheerily at her mother as she runs out the door.

She knows there will be questions later, some repeated and some not, but she doesn’t fancy having to answer any of them now.

\---

The TARDIS is exactly where it had been parked the day before – right behind the building, in a seldom-used alley.

“Weren’t you here last night?” Yaz stares – she’s pretty sure it was facing the exact same way, and landed at the exact same angle.

The Doctor walks straight in, as though she didn’t even open the door herself, and Yaz follows quickly. On reflection, the TARDIS probably opened the doors itself. “Decided to stick around – it was only a day, went and looked at the leftover Christmas decorations. Looks quite nice, actually, but the fake snow is a bit weird. The fireworks were alright, though.”

“I would hope so, they went on for long enough.” Yaz had been intervening in a fist fight at that point, which the fireworks had outlasted.

The Doctor stared at her, brow furrowed. “You missed them?”

“Course I did, I was at work.”

The Doctor pauses, then grins. “Okay, new plan.”

\---

They sit, perched on the edge of the TARDIS, their legs dangling over the streets that are a little too far below. As soon as the Doctor had suggested it, she’d immediately launched into describing the antigravity fields around the TARDIS, and how it was perfectly safe, and how they wouldn’t even get cold. “I mean, sometimes she’ll throw me out, but usually I’ve done something wrong like try to blow her up. Not usually on purpose.”

Only sixteen hours back, and instead of Sheffield, they’re floating over London, the bank of the Thames filled with people below them. It’s freezing outside, but with the warmth of the TARDIS, it doesn’t seep in. They’ve both left their coats elsewhere, and the Doctor has her sleeves rolled up. Yaz tries not to stare, tries not to let her eyes linger on the way the tendons in her wrist move, the line of her arm through to the tips of her fingers.

They’re both nursing glasses of prosecco, in crystal glasses that Yaz had guessed on sight were not from a time in her own past – “Got them from an art historian in Venice, well, technically they weren’t a gift, but I had my hands full at the reception for the city sinking anyway…” The Doctor’s nose had wrinkled a little when she tried it, but she’d shrugged and kept drinking it, so that had been a good sign.

She pulls Yaz a little closer, an arm around her back, and Yaz relaxes, her head against the Doctor’s shoulder. She’d be tempted to let her eyes drift shut, just for a moment, to let the sound of the TARDIS and the Doctor’s hearts wash over her, to let the scent of motor oil and Earl Grey linger just a little more intensely. But the sight of a hundred thousand people, and of the South Bank by night, is too much to look away from.

“So how was your New Year, then?”

Yaz takes a deep breath, decides to avoid the details – not that any of them were particularly interesting. “We were busy. Really busy. Finished work three hours late busy.” And then the Doctor pulls her even closer, drops her head to Yaz’s. Yaz wraps her arm around the Doctor’s back, hugs her back. “I mean, it’s been worse, at least some of them listened to me.”

She feels the Doctor’s head lift away from hers, and shifts to look up, as best she can without lifting her own head. And then the Doctor’s voice, an edge of concern to it. “They’d be mad not to listen to you. Who could say no to you, anyway?”

Yaz shrugs a little, feels the Doctor’s head drop against her own again, and relaxes. Sure, most people on the wrong side of a copper have plenty of things to say, but she’s not going into that now, not in this perfect moment. Not when _that_ is what the Doctor has to say about that.

Less than ten minutes until midnight – she knows she won’t be able to see it on Big Ben this year, but it’s not as though she’d be able to see Big Ben from here, anyway. The monolith of scaffolding is just behind them. That had been the Doctor’s plan, anyway – “Remember when that spaceship flew into it?” Yaz had been a kid – she’d have sworn it was something she saw on the telly, just in a movie.

And then the Doctor sits up a little straighter – Yaz does the same, then mirrors her pose of leaning forward, prosecco cradled between her hands. They’re both still on their first glasses, but between the sights and the company, Yaz isn’t sure she needs it.

The Doctor points out the Globe, and looks at Yaz, wide-eyed. “Did I ever tell you about the time I met Shakespeare? Lovely bloke, he fancied me. Did get possessed by witches, though.”

“No way.” She wishes she could muster up something a little more useful, but she can’t stop staring at the way in which the Doctor’s eyes are alight, the way she’s smiling at the memory.

Can’t stop staring at her lips as she smiles.

“You know _Love’s Labour’s Won_? Turns out the witches wrote half of that too. It’s fine, all worked out in the end. And I think he wound up fancying my friend, too. She didn’t fancy him back, thought he had bad breath.”

“Your friend?” Yaz isn’t sure she wants to know more, but she presses it nonetheless, just a little.

“You’d have liked her. Very smart, wouldn’t let me get away with anything. Course, back then, I probably needed it.”

“Why didn’t she stay?”

The Doctor pauses. “She was going to become a doctor – would have been a bit confusing with two of us on the TARDIS. But she did well, we kept in touch, for a while.”

Another time, Yaz might have pressed further, but not tonight.

She can’t anyway, not when the Doctor breaks the silence: “Actually, I think that was when I met Queen Elizabeth. Well, the first time I met her properly, anyway. Ooh, is that the time already?”

Yaz glances back to the city – there are a few countdowns visible, flashing lights on buildings, a couple of screens. Down to the final seconds. She braces to be in the middle of the fireworks, places her glass behind her so she doesn’t drop it.

The Doctor isn’t watching the skyline, though; Yaz can see, just out of the corner of her eye, that the Doctor’s focus is entirely on her, her face close, her lips parted just a little.

Three, two, one, and in the split second before the fireworks, Yaz makes a decision. Turns to look at the Doctor, faces inches apart, and she doesn’t even need to speak above a whisper: “Happy new year.”

And then she kisses her.

It isn’t the half a glass of prosecco, or the height of the TARDIS, or the lights flashing behind her eyelids that make Yaz’s head spin. It’s the touch of the Doctor’s lips against hers, warm and soft and feeling so utterly right.

She pulls away, lets it be just an innocent kiss to ring in the year, as much as she wishes it wasn’t. But then the Doctor places a hand on her waist, and leans in to kiss her back.

And in that moment, Yaz could have been anywhere, and it wouldn’t have mattered. Just the warmth of the Doctor, so very close, and the feel and the _taste_ of her, and she’d happily never let this moment end.


End file.
